


honey, we came to dance

by opensummer



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Blanket Permission, Fluff, Fluff without Plot, Gen, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, and Natasha’s gonna give it to him, endorphins make you happy, exercise causes endorphins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-02 17:25:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17268302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/opensummer/pseuds/opensummer
Summary: Natasha takes Steve swing dancing. Surprisingly, he manages to have a good time.





	honey, we came to dance

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Night_Inscriber](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Night_Inscriber/gifts).



> Night asked for 10th Kingdom Virginia/Wolf fluff or anything with Steve Rogers when I offered them a solstice fic. I didn’t quite make solstice and I’m not much of one for Christmas so I figured I’d do as the hobbits do and give it to them for my birthday.  
>  ~~Shhh, it’s still my birthday week.~~
> 
> I ended up writing both.
> 
> This is the Steve Rogers bit. Timeline wise it’s pretty much right before the events of CAtWS

Natasha shows up on Steve’s doorstep at half past seven in the evening on a Saturday with a garment bag slung over her shoulder in a blue dress with a full skirt and heels. Her hair is in curls, her lipstick immaculate, and for a moment he has to blink, thrown back through time.

He’s grateful, he thinks, that she’s not wearing red.

“You got plans?” Natasha asks with an obnoxious pop of her gum and that’s grounding. Women don't snap their gum where he comes from.

“No.” He says, and it’s half a lie but he can’t claim that dinner and finishing his book as plans exactly. Not when he’s rereading the book, and dinner is leftovers from two nights ago.

“Then get dressed loser, we’re going out.” She’s presents him with the garment bag gently, in contrast with her words.

“Loser?” Steve asks, quirking an eyebrow.

“Mean Girls. It’s a movie. You should add it to your list.” He nods, scratches a note into the little notebook she gave him.

“Now chop chop.” She says making little shooing noises. Steve, the Black Widow had noted in the file she built on him responded well to orders from women, a combination of his single mother and Peggy Carter’s legacy.

That file had landed her as his handler and Nat is only vaguely resentful of that fact. It’s not like Black Widows had _friends_ , after all.

She pokes through his living room absently while he’s changing keeping an ear towards the door. He knows she’ll snoop, of course, but it’s best not to advertise that fact.

Studies the stacks of books, notes what's new, adjusts the recommendations she’s planning on making accordingly.

When the floorboards by his door creak, she perches on the arm of the sofa and wolf whistles when he steps through the door. Coulson’s creepily detailed folder had included measurements and it looks like they’re still largely correct, a year later. He looks good in a suit, tie military neat at his neck.

“Where are we going?” He asks, grabbing his keys and ushering her out of the apartment.

“A place I know.”

“You know that’s not really helpful, right?”

“I know.” She says and snaps her gum at him again.

Steve surrenders and lets her lead him out into the night.

* * *

She drives, and plays Glenn Miller for him, the sort of music brass bands used to use to get a crowd going before the dancing started. They don’t drive far before she pulls into a private parking lot and takes a ticket to park the car. 

“Come on,” Nat says, “it’s a short walk.”

So they walk, Steve matching her pace, barely above an amble, and he’s wondering if he’s reading that right, that she’s nervous.

Natasha’s too good to actually show signs of nerves but he thinks it’s in the way she’s slowed her pace, the way she’s determinedly keeping the conversation casual, offering up coworkers for him to date, mocking him for his taste in books.

They hook a right into an alley and descend a set of steps to a door that’s got a fresh paint of coat on it, in emerald green. Natasha knocks and whispers a password to the window that slides open, before the door opens for them.

It’s not like stepping back in time, but the place has a similarity or three with the gin joints he and Buck used to frequent back before the war. It’s got a cramped hallway with a coat check at the end, opens up to a bar with a dance floor, lit up with soft golden bulbs. There’s a stage and a brass band warming up, booths lining the walls. The women are in dresses and heels, the men in suits.

It needs a haze of cigarette smoke, the smell of stale beer to line up with the places he remembers, but it’s so close his heart aches. He closes his eyes, takes a steadying breath. When he opens them Nat is watching him, expression unreadable. 

“This ok?” She asks, voice light.

“Just fine.” He says, and helps her shrug out of her coat. They take a booth tucked into a corner, clear lines of sight to the door and bar, and a waitress flits over to them with a pair of menus and a smile.

Nat orders old fashioneds for both of them, and when he goes to object, says, “I want to know how they compare with the real deal, back in the ‘30s.”

He snorts, tells her, “We were just grateful they didn’t make us go blind when we drank them back then.”

When the waitress comes back with drinks, they order burgers and a basket of cheese fries. Once she’s gone again, they clink their glasses and take a sip.

“Much better than they used to be.” He tells her. 

They don’t talk much while they’re waiting for food since the band’s got going in earnest now and they'rr good. He taps his toes to them, drums the bass line into the table.

The fries come up first and they devour them and manage half a conversation about going out in the forties before Bucky’s name becomes a stone in his throat, and they talk about music instead.

They get a second round of drinks when the burgers come, and the band takes a set break, adjusting a few things on stage while a dame in red comes up on stage. She’s blonde, not brunette but he still misses the first half of her speech. People applaud when she’s done, and he turns to Natasha.

“You decided I didn’t get out enough and you thought going out dancing was the solution?” He’s more amused than angry, and he watches her shoulders relax a bit. From anybody else, it would be a sign of relief. “I’ve got two left feet.”

“That’s alright.” She says, amused. “I used to be a ballerina.”

He chokes on his drink. When he’s finished, coughing it out, “No lie?”

“No lie.” She confirms, and launches into a story about her dancing career that sounds about eighty percent made up. It carries them through their burgers and the first two dances, with him calling horseshit on the more outrageous bits.

By the end he isn’t even that nervous when she sets her napkin aside and asks him to dance.

“How _modern_ of you.” Steve says, faux offended and takes her arm to get to the dance floor.

He’s been keeping an eye on the floor while she talked and been relieved to find that he’ll be far from the only one who is less than perfect. About half the couples on the floor are fumbling through the Lindy hop and he knows he can do better than that, even five years out of practice. The other half are the sort of dancers Bucky used to be, expert, the kind who love the floor and the movement. Still he won’t stand out too much.

She chose an easy one for them to go in on, and her timing is perfect, swinging them in to the crowd at the beginning of a measure. After that he focuses on following her lead and not stepping on her toes.

He’s used to moving with her on missions and it turns out the dance floor’s not all that different. After a dance he starts to relax, lean into the movements a little more, get a little more daring with the spins and twists. Natasha matches him perfectly and he thinkshe might believe her ballerina story.

They dance three before breaking for water and sitting one out. Steve hasn’t felt this loose in months.

When couples are lining up for the next one he asks, “You ready to get back out there?”

“Thought you’d never ask.”

They get another two in before they start to get dangerous on the floor, Natasha counting off time in his ear and whispering instructions on how to do a lift, or a spin, throwing her out into space, than hauling her back.

They alternate dancing with water breaks, drinking old fashioneds and laughing. Natasha gets pulled on the floor by one of the expert dancers and his partner sits with Steve for the two they dance, talking about art. He’s a gallery owner, here because his partner loves to dance and he assumes Steve is the same, as Nat and the other guy tear it up on the floor.

Then it’s back to the dance floor and time blurs a bit, the way it always does when you’re having a great time and don’t want it to end.

The bar closes at two and they dance right up until the moment the staff switches on all the lights. Then they spill out onto the street with the rest of the crowd and wave goodbyes as they head for the car.

They amble again, slow and content.

“Hey.” Steve says leaning down to nudge Nat with a shoulder. “Thanks.”

“No problem.” She says.


End file.
